As a fitness professional, the number one question I am asked is: What should I be eating?
Fitness professionals, doctors, and nurses learn a little bit about nutrition. But, to REALLY LEARN about nutrition takes years of study, and usually a degree. With that being said . . . here are some carefully crafted and non-professional opinions about nutrition.
Pay Attention to Labels
Look for low ingredient foods. If you don’t recognize the ingredients . . . walk away. For instance, peanut butter doesn’t need 17 ingredients to be yummy. Then, check the sodium content. I started paying attention to this when I gained eight pounds of water weight in one week during my second pregnancy. Yikes!
Did you know that most Marinara sauces have anywhere between 500 – 1000-plus mgs of sodium per half cup? And who EVER eats just a half cup of marinara? (You do? Shut up). Canned veggies, beans, soups, and broths are other high sodium culprits. Look for “low sodium” or “no salt added” labels.
Eat Real Food
Nature is FULL of nutrients that our bodies need to survive, but many of us never eat fruits and veggies. Most of your diet should be fruit and veg, most of us forget that a lot of the time.
Just Ditch Store Bought/Processed Foods
I’ve always loved to cook, but there are certain things that I’ve only recently started making from scratch. Believe it or not, our grandmas and great-grandmas made EVERYTHING from scratch, or from their simplest forms. If you are craving comfort food, here are a few of my favorite recipes to replace store-bought stuff:
Yellow Birthday Cake: This will make you die and go to heaven.
Artisan Bread: Easiest and most impressive artisan bread recipe, ever.
Cream of Mushroom Soup: This will make your husband think you are an even bigger rock star than he already thinks you are. If you aren’t vegan, just sub back in regular cream and low sodium chicken broth. I’ve made it both ways.
Beans: Easy peasy beans (cheaper, too).
Velveeta: I made this at Thanksgiving for my broccoli Cheddar recipe. We all peed in our pants it was so good.
This is a short list . . . but the point is — DIY. It tastes better, it’s better for you, and you get the satisfaction of saying, “I made this. with. my. own. hands. fool.” Or whatever other snarky thing you feel like saying at dinner.
Watch Your Portions and Keep Track of What You Eat
After my first baby was born, I ate my face off, nursed a ton, and lost my weight in six weeks. When I was pregnant with baby number two, I pigged out and expected the weight to melt off as I nursed. I wish this guy was here to correct me at month seven while I ate ice cream daily. At 17 months postpartum, I joined Weight Watchers and was appalled at how much I’d been eating. At 18 months postpartum, I was finally back to my pre-pregnancy weight. Now number two baby is almost two and I’m finally BELOW my pre-pregnancy weight. WHY? Portion control. Weight Watchers was a great way to kick start me into paying attention. Now I use My Fitness Pal. I LOVE this app and here’s why:
1. I see my nutrition clearly broken down: What I need more of and what I ate too much of.
2. Most restaurants and foods are already in this giant data base, making calorie counting EASY!
Find a Friend
Find someone non-spouse-y to hold you accountable. Being healthy together is more fun. Swap recipes and tips.
Moderate and Celebrate
Life has to be a balance of these two verbs. I love eating and some of my best memories always involve food and a table. It’s okay to have a cupcake or a glass of wine. Just don’t do it daily.
What have you learned about nutrition since becoming a mom? What steps have your made to get you and your family healthier?
I REALLY love a cheeseburger and fries from a drive thru. BUT, I have worked hard in 2014 to not let that be an easy crutch when we are out running errands and heading home for lunch, we just GO HOME FOR LUNCH (no drive thru). Might mean that that I fix sandwiches that morning so when I come home it is faster to get the kids eating OR they just might have to whine a few minutes while I fix lunch but it has been a great step towards healthy. I also have started reading labels (since we found out our kid is allergic to food dye WHICH IS IN EVERYTHING) and just cutting out the processed foods in general. Kids LOVE making cookies with me from scratch, we use our ice cream maker all the time now for fresh fruit sherbert (yeah, there is some sugar in there but i know all 5 of the ingredients) and meal planning helps you also avoid the easy take out fix. We weren’t the most UNhealthy people in the world, but we certainly aren’t the healthiest and I have found that setting little goals, like only “one trip to the drive thru a week” is easy to keep. Then once that is routine I add something else to our “get healthier” list.
Emily, we love a good greasy meal, too! I think for us, it’s learning to make that food “special occasion only” food. We try to make most of our food real and nutritious, while leaving room to enjoy the comfort stuff, too. Life is all about balance and honestly, it’s something I’m still working on. Like we’ve talked about before-the dyes are killers for our family, too! So it’s just better to make stuff at home. I was so happy with the frosting I made for C’s Bday cake this year…just added cocoa to homemade butter cream-not nutritious, but I knew every ingredient in it…which is enough for me!
And I appreciated a color-free frosting that would not make my children insane/wrathful. Unfortunately those cupcakes are ALL that #2 ate. Why?? Who knows?
Hahaha!!! Because he’s your #2! He didn’t eat anything else? At least you know I made those suckers from scratch…C and I finished the last of the buttercream today. MMMM….so creamy.